News

Community projects can bid for council cash

Malvern Hills District Council has launched the improved two-part ward budget scheme for the next year to enable councillors to better support local good causes by giving every councillor up to £500 to support of community projects of their choice in their ward.

Cllr David Hughes, leader of the council, said: “It’s great to see cross party support for this initiative and I look forward to seeing what fantastic community causes councillors find to spend this money on throughout the district.”

A new fund of £20,000 will enable councillors to bid for up to £5,000 for a capital ward project.

Submissions to the fund will be reviewed annually with decisions on the projects made by a panel made up of the leader of the council, the council’s head of resources and a nominated member from each of the three political groups.

Anyone interested in putting forward an idea for a community project should get in touch with their local ward member.

For more information, go to malvernhills.gov.uk.

Comments (1)

Errrr. What a weird piece of reporting. First, in what way is this possibly "the improved two-part award scheme." The previous scheme gave an allowance of £1,000 to each Councillor, for them to spend on community projects within their ward, with reasonable rules and limits. This is what many councillors wanted restored. WCC operates a similar scheme with £10,000 per councillor. Instead of this very simple scheme we have the more complex two-part one. There is a panel, for which expenses can be claimed, and they will decide what the money is spent on in a ward they are not familiar with! Furthermore the applications for up to £5,000 more are on a first come, first served basis, so what happens to those projects that are launched towards the end of the financial year? It only takes four people to make claims and have them upheld and all the money is gone in an instant. There are no safeguards at all. It will be interesting to see if Conservative politicians are the first to have their bids approved......

And what a hypocritical comment by David Hughes. Only two months ago, when asked if the £1,000 ward allowances would be reinstated, he said no, it was not the best use of limited funds and everything else in the budget was of a higher priority. Minutes later he went on to propose significant allowance rises for himself and his party colleagues.

However, it would seem that he has been persuaded by Melanie Baker, to think again. Melanie proposed no £500 grant, just the pot from which councillors could claim in the year leading up to an election!! It took an Independent Cllr. to get it amended to its current form - better but not perfect. We can only guess at Melanie Baker's motivation. She said very little and in fact forgot to formally propose the motion, so had to be reminded by the Chairman!

This is not a press release, it is a shameful piece of advertising for the Conservative Party. Can we have some balanced reporting, please Gazette?

Errrr. What a weird piece of reporting. First, in what way is this possibly "the improved two-part award scheme." The previous scheme gave an allowance of £1,000 to each Councillor, for them to spend on community projects within their ward, with reasonable rules and limits. This is what many councillors wanted restored. WCC operates a similar scheme with £10,000 per councillor. Instead of this very simple scheme we have the more complex two-part one. There is a panel, for which expenses can be claimed, and they will decide what the money is spent on in a ward they are not familiar with! Furthermore the applications for up to £5,000 more are on a first come, first served basis, so what happens to those projects that are launched towards the end of the financial year? It only takes four people to make claims and have them upheld and all the money is gone in an instant. There are no safeguards at all. It will be interesting to see if Conservative politicians are the first to have their bids approved......
And what a hypocritical comment by David Hughes. Only two months ago, when asked if the £1,000 ward allowances would be reinstated, he said no, it was not the best use of limited funds and everything else in the budget was of a higher priority. Minutes later he went on to propose significant allowance rises for himself and his party colleagues.
However, it would seem that he has been persuaded by Melanie Baker, to think again. Melanie proposed no £500 grant, just the pot from which councillors could claim in the year leading up to an election!! It took an Independent Cllr. to get it amended to its current form - better but not perfect. We can only guess at Melanie Baker's motivation. She said very little and in fact forgot to formally propose the motion, so had to be reminded by the Chairman!
This is not a press release, it is a shameful piece of advertising for the Conservative Party. Can we have some balanced reporting, please Gazette?Casmal